The Forge Archives

Capes is a superhero game with very broad abilities.  Your Powers or Tropes can be pretty much anything that can happen.  "God answers my prayers" is just as legitimate as "Laser-beam eyes".

This is great fun in play.  But my experience is that this can be very intimidating and time-consuming for people who just want to make a character and start.

The system also has Exemplars, who are NPCs specifically linked to the heroes in specific moral arenas.  So the love interest, or the police-man doggedly hunting your fugitive, that sort of thing.  Exemplars must be shared with other players... so maybe the dogged police-man is also somebody's love interest.

Also very fun and very time-consuming.

I would like to create tools to help radically increase the speed of character creation.  And when I say "radically" I mean taking it down from two hours for a group of four to... oh, say... ten minutes.  I'd settle for half an hour, but ten minutes would be better.

I have two immediate recommendations/possibilities.  I'd love to hear opinions or (even better!) ideas that do a better job than these.

First the one I thought of:  Allow people to create a character by combining pre-drafted modules that are built to work well enough, and to work together.  Specifically, I could see the following:

[*]A Power Set consists of three Powers, a level 2 Trope and three optional add-ons... a level 4 Power, a level 5 Power and a level 4 Trope.[*]A Personality consists of three Attitudes, a level 1 Trope, a level 3 Trope and three optional add-ons... a level 4 Attitude, a level 5 Attitude and a level 4 or 5 Trope.[*]Players choose two modules, combine them and then add three options.[*]They can then, of course, modify absolutely anything... this is just to quickly create a baseline functional character.[*]Power Sets would be things like "Speedster", "Martial Artist", "Invulnerable Strongman", "Gadgeteer", etc.[*]Personalities would be things like "Grim crimefighter", "Spunky beginner", "Hothead", "Psychotic Loner" and so on.[/list:u]I have a feeling that the same modular approach could create Exemplars that can easily be fitted together with those of other heroes, but I need a bit more time to think about that before posting it.

My wife recommends a somewhat more radical idea:  Play a first scene ("Origin?") that creates the character during play.  I'm having a bit of a harder time getting my head around this, because I don't quite see how you would have the same mechanical system guarantee that you use/invent all of the Abilities that you'll need for the hero.  But I do love the idea of diving in immediately, and I agree that there would be somewhat less paralysis about "What would be a good ability for me to have" in actual context.  "The bad-guys fire a machine gun at you"... "I'm really, REALLY good at dodging bullets!"

Tony,

Let me just say that i really like both suggestions.  So why not just use them both?  HeroQuest has three accepted character generation options: Narrative Method, List Method, and Develop-thru-Play.  I can see Capes using a "conventional" get everything together first, then play.  That is probably the most time consuming.  I can see develop-thru-play as you suggest below.  Your character has a bunch of blank slots, need something?  Write it down.  Once it is written down it is stuck there...  Even with this method i would suggest requiring at least one or two Exemplars before play since they really catalyze things.

As for pre-built (sort of) Exemplars i suggest something relatively simple.  Write up a series of paragraph discriptions of Exemplars who are tied to two characters.  Examples include: Love interest who is someone's sister (a classic), Villain who is the nemesis of two characters, neighbor who works with someone else...  Or perhaps instead a list of relationships, how the Exemplar is tied to a character such as: Love interest, sibling, parent, long-time friend, coworker, nemesis, mentor, rival.  Then each player just picks from that list.  "Bob is my... coworker."  "Well, Bob is my... neighbor."

Perhaps it does not entirely belong here, but i wanted to note that Player Characters as Exemplars does not seem to work very well...  The fact that they can not necessarily be dragged into whatever the situation is seems to make them less suited to plot development than NPC Exemplars.  I would consider adding explicit text to clarify that.

Thomas

I agree on PCs as Exemplars.  Neither the player nor the Editor have enough narrative control over another player's hero.

On making Exemplars... heh... okay, I'll toss this idea out half-formed and see what people make of it:

I was thinking of making character fragments which link a relationship ("Charming Love Interest") to either a Personality of Power-Set.

Ideally, I would see people matching up quickly like this:

"Okay, I've got a Prince Charming Personality in search of a Power-Set"
"Really?  I've got a Dogged Pursuer power-set in search of a Personality."
"So the cop obsessing on taking you down is the perfect soul-mate that I can't connect with because of my many secrets?"
"Hey, works for me."

This has the benefit of creating the link and the Exemplar-character at the same time.  In the absence of some really quick way of creating mechanical statistics for Exemplars, I fear that they will never get done in most games, which would be a loss.

Hmm... on the surface i guess i just have to say that that is brilliant.  No, i am dead serious.  It ties itself in perfectly with the Power-set/Personality stuff (which i already consider to be a good idea).

While i am thinking about it, the Power-set/Personality stuff is also a great way to build website traffic.  Just put up a new pair every week and i am sure that a number of people will keep stopping by.  Provide somewhere for people to post their own?  You have your own little online Capes community right there...

Thomas

Mix & match modularity is good; I've recommended a Monster Manual approach -- i.e. big books 'o stock characters -- as ideally suited for Capes before. But... your wife is right.

It's actually not too difficult to come up with a cool "high concept" for a character: "I'm a skate-punk activist werewolf"; "I'm an energy being in a robotic body"; "I'm a traumatized ferrokinetic street kid"; "God answers my prayers, uh-oh" (all real Capes characters from last night's playtest, in which I gather character creation took longer than you wanted). What is hard, especially if you're new to the system (let along RPGs in general) is filtering that high concept through the framework of Powers, Attitudes, and Tropes.

One approach is to hand people a bunch of modules to Lego-snap together to enact their high concept. ("Okay, you plug the"punk activist" module into the "werewolf" module; you plug the "energy powers" module into the "robot body" module). But you will never, ever, ever come up with enough Lego blocks for everyone, no matter how many cool submissions end up on the Capes website and get collected into glossy supplements that make you millions of dollars. (Ideally).

The path to success is not to try. (Yes, now I'm a Taoist, or at least Yoda). Or at least, don't try too hard. Allow a new player to start with a "high concept" -- and remember in Hollywood terms a high concept is usually "model A combined with model B" (or cliche A with cliche B), so it inherently has both accessibility and a bit of complexity. Then whenever the player wants to make a roll, allow them to fill in a Power/Attitude/Trope slot with anything that (a) fits the situation and (b) fits their high concept. Within a few scenes, you'll have (1) nicely fleshed-out characters that (2) exploit the mechanics well but (3) aren't just random "I manifest this useful skill now without regard for coherence" because of the limiting power of the High Concept.

You might even be able to adapt something like this for Exemplars.

EDIT: By the way, this models much better the way comic-book writers come up with their characters, I'd imagine. And it also means your character advancement system is simply a continuation of your character creation system -- "here, you got a bunch of [XP equivalents], have another slot to fill in that fits your High Concept."

Also I have never used so many BBCode formatting features before in my life. Fun!

I'd like to add my support for 'stock' Power and Personality templates. This is a very nice idea, especially for players who are coming in from other genres of game (D&D *cough*) and aren't necessarily comic otaku.

However, do you need to specify the numbers? The 'core' three Powers may be 1/2/3 for a 3-Powered Character, but they may be better placed at 3/4/5 if the character takes two 'optional' powers. Same for Personality and Attitudes - I think the list is sufficient

If this doesn't make sense, let me know and I'll write up an example.

Also, if you want to generate traffic, how about a series of paired Heroes and Villains? You could write up a Hero character, his 'nemesis' Villain, and explain how the two can interact through their Exemplars.

Oh, and IMHO characters who are used as examples in the rulebook (such as Zip and Chief Mannelli) should be statted somewhere in that book, either at the end or in a sidebar. This will help to reinforce the Actual Play examples.

EDIT: Cross-posting with Sydney, the "high concept" idea is also very good, I think it proves that there is more than one way to skin this particular cat. Why not use all of them?

For example: a player may have a great concept, but can only think of two powers, three attitudes and a single Trope. Fill these in, fill in the blanks during play, allow the character to 'reallocate' the numbers at the end of the session to accomodate the new abilities. I suspect that this is even closer to emulating the style of the books - the Heroes still start with some Powers etc. but these develop during the story.

And Sydney - I think the Yoda quote you're missing is 'do or do not.. there is no try.' <g>

Okay, I think Sydney's got a better handle on the develop-through-play idea than I do.  So I'm going to ask him (or anyone who thinks they have a good answer) the thing that's most weighing on my mind:  Will a character created through the circumstances of one scene be likely to be effective in another type of scene?

My experience is that it takes some pretty serious forethought to make a hero who can meaningfully participate in both foiling a bank robbery and discussing a proposed mutant registration law.  My fear is that if you start them off in a bank robbery then you've committed yourself to do nothing but foil violent crimes from here on out.  But as I've said, my understanding of the dynamic is very limited, so my fears may well be groundless.

Doug:  What you're saying about a loose grab-bag of abilities that can be ordered any which way makes good sense.  Better sense than specifying the levels.  Consider that simplification stolen.

EDIT:  Or... hrm... I may just recommend that re-ordering the powers is the most obvious possible modification.  I still like the idea that people can go "Pick A, Pick B" and have a default character they could play with, but which may beg for customization.

Quote from: TonyLBOkay, I think Sydney's got a better handle on the develop-through-play idea than I do.

[Sydney looks around nervously]

Quote from: TonyLBit takes some pretty serious forethought to make a hero who can meaningfully participate in both foiling a bank robbery and discussing a proposed mutant registration law.  My fear is that if you start them off in a bank robbery then you've committed yourself to do nothing but foil violent crimes from here on out...

I suspect that's where the strategy comes in. The rules for this option should warn you sternly: On the one hand, you have total freedom to pop up appropriate abilities for the situation you're in; pn the other hand, once you use that slot, it's locked. So maybe you hold back in the bank robbery ("Um, I think my level 4 trope is 'hide'") because you want to save your character-building ammunition for the mutant registration debate.

But this is also a way the players can tell the GM what they want to do. (Like TROS spiritual attributes?). If everyone goes all-out for the eye-popping combat powers, they're begging you to throw more combat scenes at them.

And finally you've left yourself the Ars Magica-esque out that if people hyper-specialize their primary character for one kind of scene, they can always switch to another character for a different kind of scene: "Hmmm -- Clobbermoron won't be too good in the mutant registration debate, will he? Well, I'll hold him back and spend my Story Token instead on having his Love Exemplar, Miss Truegood, be in the witness gallery to make a stirring, heartfelt speech." (Because in the comics and movies, legislators and judges always allow speeches from random people in the gallery, right?).

More good points from Sydney.

Let's play Devil's Advocate - does it matter if a hero has different powers for different scenes?

Or to put it another way, can a hero have a 'bank' of Powers (and possibly Tropes or even Attitudes) that they can call on during a scene, which they only need to place as they are used? This would only work with a unifying 'high concept', and may be a Scary Change of Direction, so I'm not going to shout for this - I just want to know what y'all think about it.

One advantage is that heroes can gain extra attributes as their character develops, without unbalancing the game (still limited to deploying 3/4/5 during any Scene.) Another advantage is that it allows for more flexibility between different scenes - I think this solves Tony's problem as posted.

The main disadvantage is that it may result in too many attributes to keep track of, and a 'blurring' of the initial character concept, but I think there are ways to keep this in check.

Wow... yeah, these are some major possible changes.  Until I'm more sure that I've got my head around it I will restrict myself to small, straightforward comments and questions.

I see having different banks of abilities on a single character as being very similar to having different characters in a troupe who bring different sets of abilities to the table.  Essentially they are both ways to minimize the impact of a "wrong pick" by diluting it in a larger pool of total abilities, yes?

Doug, an interesting suggestion regarding the "bank" of powers, but i just do not believe that it would work.  You touch on it briefly, but i believe that the incoherence of character will spin out of control.

Sydney's point on specialization is well taken.  Consider a classica example... Wolverine does not get involved in Mutant Registration Debates...  And looking at his Powers, Attitudes, and Tropes shows us why.

To address the issue of on-the-fly character generation i have two points:

1. As Sydney said, you can always choose to hold back and save some slots for later.  And since you should be talking to the Editor about scenes the players should be playing in the scenes that they want to play in...

2. Once i as the Editor see a character, and what he is specializing in, clearly i craft my scenes to him.  Take our actual play for example, the Gray Ghost does not get scenes that place him in the courtroom, he does not have to deal with guarding villains he has captured.  He does not have to maintain or manufacture his special equipment.  This is because it is clear from his list of Powers, Attitudes, and Tropes that you as a player are not really interested in him doing these things.  The result here is that i will not start such a scene without a specific request since circumstantial evidence indicates that you do not want to play in those types of scenes...

EDIT: Oh, and one more thing.  Part of the fun is finding ways to make your Abilities work in a given situation.  I point you to the Gray Ghosts encounter with Dorian Wise.  The Ghost had to get creative in order to utilize his Abilities.  Consider also "Ignore the pain", it is cooler because you use it in different ways, displaying new facets instead of new abilities.

Thomas

I have no problem with specialization.  But there's a difference between specializing and just painting yourself into a corner.  One is conscious, the other is the outcome of untrained system manipulation.  Untrained system manipulation is going to be the norm for players who are just starting in Capes.

Some players know the system well enough to develop and follow a strategy for how they need to play in order to create workable characters.  These players also know the system well enough to write up a character from scratch in five minutes or less.

Is there a way for Develop-through-play to be made obvious for the players who don't yet have this level of system insight?  Or is it inherently a more advanced method of character generation, for experienced players only?

SIDE NOTE:  The click-and-lock modular system, as outlined above, would permit people to make a character with four Powers, four Attitudes and four Tropes.  Does this strike anyone as a problem?

For me... it's not the way I would make a character, but I don't see that it's going to break anything or be radically less fun than the other possible allocations.

Quote from: LordSmerfDoug, an interesting suggestion regarding the "bank" of powers, but i just do not believe that it would work.  You touch on it briefly, but i believe that the incoherence of character will spin out of control.

Oh, it will, without some other control (or very good players).

But what if there were some simple rules to prevent this? For example:

1) Characters must have a 'high concept' and all new Powers/Attitudes/Tropes must mesh with that concept, as well as with in-play experience.

2) A maximum cap on the total pool; this pool could increase, slowly over the duration of the campaign.

3) Certain Powers and Attitudes are 'core' and must be placed at the beginning of every Scene.

Having said all of this, I wouldn't include this in the Basic Game, as it adds time to Character Creation and Scene handing. But if there was an Advanced Capes sourcebook... I think it would fit right in.

Quote from: TonyLBSIDE NOTE: The click-and-lock modular system, as outlined above, would permit people to make a character with four Powers, four Attitudes and four Tropes. Does this strike anyone as a problem?

Having no '5' rating prevents a character from Bumping a '5', but if you can split dice this isn't a problem. For what it's worth, what's to stop a Hero having 5 Powers rated at '3', instead of 1/2/3/4/5? But I think all of these considerations are best left as For Advanced Players for now - of course, you are well within your rights to say otherwise.

'Click-and-lock' will still work with the requirement to have a 3/4/5 split, just specify that only one '5' and two '4's are allowed, and the '5' must have a related '4'.